The Book of Lies (37 page)

Then a distraction. Something flew wildly about the dragon’s head, stealing its attention.

Gadfly! But how could she fly without the Book?

Marcel saw the answer instantly. The little pouch was tied around her neck, and yes, when he took a closer look he could make out the tiny shape of Bea herself, clutching fearlessly on to the untidy mane. Gadfly beat her wings, swerving and dipping like the insect she was named after, and miraculously the dragon’s head swerved away from the helpless children below. But Gadfly and Bea were in grave danger themselves now, as the beast focused its fury on them alone.

“Get behind him!” Marcel shouted desperately to Bea, though whether he could be heard amid the soldiers” screams and the dragon’s mighty roar there was no way to tell. But at the last moment, the horse ducked sharply, just as the terrible flames shot out into the night. On the ground below, the
children felt the fire’s heat, but it was so high above their heads that it died harmlessly in the night air.

“Run!” cried Nicola urgently, and they began to flee as fast as they could before the dragon could take another breath. All except Fergus. Starkey’s dagger still lay where he had dropped it, and holding it by the blade Fergus took aim and sent it spinning towards the beast.

Marcel watched in awe as the dagger tumbled end over end and then struck not one of the impregnable scales, but the fleshy back of the creature’s claw. A bellow of rage split the night air, and in that same terrifying moment the Book of Lies fell from the dragon’s grasp. The Book dropped heavily to the ground only a few strides from Marcel and Fergus, but by then the beast was already breathing in again.

“Come on!” Fergus turned, certain that his brother would follow on his heels.

But Marcel did not move. He wasn’t looking at the horror above him. He was more concerned with what he could hear. Voices, a dozen, no, a hundred, or was it a thousand? All speaking at once and all coming from the Book of Lies. He knew what they were. Every lie the Book had ever heard, all the deceit that had corrupted it, was trying to escape before it could be destroyed by the fiery breath of the dragon it had unleashed.

Lord Alwyn was gone and there was no Master of the Books to take his place. There was only a young prince who
had taught himself the sorcerer’s arts. He had no robes of black and green embroidered with a rampant dragon above an open book, but Marcel knew he was the only one who could take Lord Alwyn’s place. It was that symbol which told him what to do now.

The magic of the Book of Lies was Lord Alwyn’s magic. For all the dragon’s power, it was part of a waning sorcery, which Marcel knew was doomed to the as Lord Alwyn had done. The Kingdom’s fate lay in new and untried hands.

Marcel raised his arm towards the beast and felt his untested magic touch its fiery skin. He reached further, right into that surging chest, and found the creature’s evil and tormented heart. He took hold and let the camp around him fade away, until the sensation of power that surged through him was enough to make him cry out. His mind lost all connection with his body. All that existed for him now was the dragon hovering over the open Book.

A bone-crushing roar filled his head, a cry of anguish loud enough to drive the dead from their graves. Towering over him, the grotesque figure of Starkey, transformed into the image of his own heart’s desire, no longer held any fear for him. His magic had taken hold of this creature’s heart and slowly, relentlessly, he drove its evil strength away into the night, out towards the distant mountains, out of his father’s kingdom.

Instantly, the beast began to change, to shrink, not into its human form but into a swirling cloud. The Book of Lies fanned
its pages all the more frantically, and as Marcel watched, fascinated, the cloud was sucked down between its covers. When it was gone, a burst of flame erupted from within the Book, burning fiercely as the voices of a thousand liars slowly died.

Marcel stood alone for many minutes until Bea brought Gadfly gently to the ground, close enough for him to stroke her nose. His brother and sister came back to stand at his side. Nicola whispered in amazement, “You saved us all, Marcel. Your magic destroyed Mortregis.”

“No, Mortregis cannot be destroyed. All I’ve done is drive him out of the Kingdom.”

Zadenwolf’s soldiers could be seen fleeing into the night, not even stopping to grab their weapons. Their leader had died a horrible death and the dragon’s single breath of flame had also set fire to much of the camp. The invading army was scattered in every direction across the scorched landscape, all thought of conquest forgotten, hoping only for a safe return to the mountains of Lenoth Crag.

At dawn, Long Beard and his elfish army arrived to join a battle that would never take place, and King Pelham emerged with a small party of soldiers from behind the city walls. Both kings found that the only occupants of the enemy camp were the four exhausted children. They were sitting in a circle around a pile of white and smouldering ashes. This was all that remained of the great Book of Lies.

M
ARCEL STOOD BEFORE THE
grave of his mother, with his father beside him and his sister a pace in front. “I wish I had some memory of her at least, as you do,” he said to the King. In those tumultuous hours in the Great Hall, he had taken part of Lord Alwyn’s memory for himself. But it would be wrong to steal the memory of his mother from his own father’s mind, no matter how much he longed to conjure up the image of her face.

He looked for Fergus, who lingered behind them, uncomfortably quiet as he had been ever since their return to the palace two days before. Memory or not, these four now shared a common grief.

“Is there any news of Damon?” Fergus asked his father.

“He is still at large,” came the reply.

Marcel knew, as they all did, that Damon had managed to escape amid the fear and confusion created by the rampant dragon. Eleanor had not been so lucky. Abandoned by her cousin, her blue gown had stood out among the many roughly dressed soldiers fleeing towards the high country. Some disgruntled villagers had dragged her, weeping, before the King. “Don’t put me back in that prison!” she’d pleaded in anguish. “I couldn’t bear it!”

But Pelham had turned away unmoved and sent her back to the chamber only ten paces from where they now stood. Eleanor had not been a prisoner there for long, however.

“Have they discovered how she did it?” Nicola asked.

“Some berries were found in a small bag beside her body. The apothecary says they are the same poison that killed your mother.”

“The kind of death she deserved, then,” said Nicola, her voice as cold as her mother’s gravestone. “We won’t mourn for her.”

Marcel had to agree. Did he still hate Eleanor, even now? Ever since his first day with Mrs Timmins, his heart had rolled about inside his chest like a fishing boat in an angry storm. He wasn’t sure whether Eleanor’s death had taken him to the crest of a wave or down to the deepest trough. He closed his eyes for a moment, hoping for calm, but it wouldn’t come to him. Not yet.

They walked through the rose garden and back towards the main entrance to the palace. Once inside, the King joined his advisers in the Great Hall, leaving the children to return to their rooms. When Nicola slipped through the heavy velvet curtain, the two boys were left to themselves, and each went to his bed and lay flat on his back, hands behind his head. For Marcel this was difficult, as Termagant instantly jumped on to his chest and sat there like a triumphant soldier who had conquered the castle.

“Marcel –” Fergus called tentatively, but before he could continue his brother cut him off.

“There’s no need to say it again. I know you’re sorry about the fight. I’ve told you a hundred times, you didn’t know the truth.”

“No, it’s not that,” Fergus responded, rolling on to his side. “I’ve been thinking about what happened before then. Do you remember what I said to the Book of Lies? “I am the son of Prince Damon”, that’s what I said, and it glowed so brightly I could barely look at it.”

“It couldn’t resist the evil inside it. It was trying to deceive, like it did in the Great Hall all those months ago, when Father tested our loyalty. It was so full of lies it wanted to cause havoc.”

This was what Marcel told his brother, but secretly he hadn’t been able to brush aside the same nagging uneasiness.

Perhaps it was something in his voice, or maybe Fergus was better at detecting his brother’s moods than Marcel was aware.
“You’ve been thinking about it too. You used your own magic that night, didn’t you? You made the Book of Lies keep to the truth; not just what was in my heart, but every kind of truth, like it was supposed to do.”

There had been too many lies for Marcel to deny it. He nodded slowly and without a word. He
had
forced the Book of Lies to do its job faithfully, as Lord Alwyn had created it to do, and yet it had not written down Fergus’s words.
I am the son of Prince Damon.

Fergus grimaced and moved to the window, where he could look out again at their mother’s grave and the chamber where the cousins had been kept prisoner. “I’ve thought of something else that doesn’t make sense. Do you remember the night we came to rescue Damon and Eleanor from down there?” He waved at the view through the window, prompting his brother to join him. “You and Nicola were too slow, so I tried to open the door on my own. The handle wouldn’t budge, Marcel. The door wouldn’t open for me any more than it would for Starkey.”

Marcel did remember, but this was the first time he had thought about it and he found himself only more confused. “What does it mean? You’re a true and rightful heir, the same as Nicola and me.” There was so much about the sorcerer’s arts that he was still to learn.

A knock at the door interrupted them. Marcel opened it to Bea, who let herself be seen clearly.

“Marcel, my grandfather and his soldiers want to be on
their way. It’s time to say goodbye.” She paused. “I’d better give you this before I go,” she added, and plunging her hand into her pocket, she pulled out the pouch containing the folded page from the Book of Lies.

“Could I look at it?” Fergus asked, and Bea held it out for him to take.

Marcel barely noticed. He was too preoccupied by the thought that Bea was about to leave. He wished he had found a spell that could calm the emotions that swirled within his chest. “Nicola will want to see you off as well,” he mumbled, to mask his discomfort.

Bea rushed through the curtain to tell Nicola the news, but once the girls had joined the two boys outside the door, Fergus broke away. “I’ll come down in a minute. There’s something I need first,” he said quickly, and strode away in the opposite direction, with considerable purpose.

“Are you sure you want to go back to the mountain?” Marcel asked Bea as they headed towards the marble staircase.

“I have to spend some time with my grandfather, Marcel. He thought I was dead!”

“But you don’t have to stay with him for ever.”

Bea didn’t bother with an answer, but let out a heavy sigh instead.

Nicola heard it and turned on him. “Leave her alone, Marcel. Of course she wants to live with Long Beard and the elves. They’re the only family she has.”

Marcel didn’t feel that was quite true any more, and when Bea looked up, her face suddenly serious, he knew she was thinking the same thing. “Don’t worry. I’ll live in the human world again, you’ll see. What about you, Marcel? You have magic in your hands now and a sorcerer’s book of your own.”

“It’s not quite the Book of Lies, though,” he said, out of respect for Lord Alwyn. For all the evil that had crept into the land in his dying days, that old man had kept the Kingdom safe for more years than anyone could remember. It sent a shudder through Marcel’s body to think of one person taking on such a burden.

Termagant led them down the grand staircase, her tail held vertical and rigid like a flagpole.

“I’ve heard rumours,” Nicola said to her brother as they followed the cat. “Father wants you to be the new Master of the Royal Books.”

“He’s talked to me about it,” Marcel replied, without giving anything away. In fact, he and the King had spent much of last night talking about it, and some time after midnight, when everyone else in the palace was safely asleep, Marcel had said yes. He had agreed to take Lord Alwyn’s place, and the very thought of it twisted his stomach into a knot.

They emerged into the courtyard at the front of the palace under a low sky that had already delivered a steady, nourishing rain through much of the morning. It had stopped for now, as though the clouds were granting them a respite for their
farewells. King Pelham was there with Long Beard, who called his granddaughter over to join him. Her friends went with her.

After they had stumbled awkwardly over the painful words of goodbye, Nicola leaned forward and hugged Bea tightly. Then it was Marcel’s turn. They held each other for a long time, and when they finally stepped back, Bea’s face was flushed and red.

“Glowing like a candle,” her grandfather teased her, “and that’s not such a good thing for an elf in the forest.” But he was laughing as he said it.

With handshakes, then a final lingering wave from the palace gates, Bea, her grandfather and the troop of elfish soldiers headed out into the city. Marcel stood watching, but they didn’t want to be gaped at by the crowds, and within moments they had all found the shadows where they were impossible to see.